


What's my name?

by greenglowsgold



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Identity Issues, Pidge | Katie Holt-centric, Speculation, Trans Female Pidge | Katie Holt, major S3 spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-15
Updated: 2017-08-15
Packaged: 2018-12-15 12:31:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11806050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greenglowsgold/pseuds/greenglowsgold
Summary: No one ever knows who they're going to be until they are. Names don't always work forever.She doesn't know who this is, but he isn't Shiro.





	What's my name?

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in a frenzy at 3am. Enjoy.

She doesn’t keep the name she’s born with.

What’s the point of it, anyway? She got it just an hour after she was born — before then, even, because her parents picked it out ahead of time. It represents more of their own hopes and dreams for their child than it ever will about the one they gave it to. They didn’t know anything about _her_ , just a weight and a cry and a set of genitalia that, it turns out, doesn’t mean shit.

So she doesn’t keep the name. She finds a new one, when she’s six years old and an actual person instead of a helpless lump of DNA. It’s the third one down on page twelve of the baby names book a librarian helps her find, and she brings it home to show her parents, beaming proudly.

(There’s a month or two where they’re not sure, not quite ready to let go, because parents do this _thing_ where they plot out whole lives before they ever happen and this sort of thing is almost never part of the plan. But they adjust, eventually, in the face of a life actually living.)

Her name is changed on official documents, on school registries, on Christmas cards. She raises her hand high when the teacher calls it out, smiles up at strangers when her parents introduce her. She writes it over and over on a hundred sheets of paper.

Katie Holt

Katie Holt

Katie Holt

 

 

Ten years later, she needs another name.

It’s different this time; it’s so different. She’s _hiding_ something now, locking it away inside herself and hacking into the FBI database to bury the key. She can’t be Katie Holt anymore. She has to be someone else. It’s awful, awful, awful, makes her sick just thinking about it, but… But.

Ten years ago, when she started being Katie, Matt tripped a boy down the sidewalk for calling her the wrong name, scraped up both their knees and came out with a tooth that wasn’t his clutched in his fist, and grinned his way through detention. Ten years ago, their father took one look at him and shook his head, told him his sister was a much better fighter but he was proud anyway, then taught them both how to make a proper fist.

It’s her father. It’s _Matt_. She’d do far worse, to get them back.

It would be better to pick something new, something wholly unassociated with the life she’s leaving behind, but part of her rebels. If nothing else, let her have this much. She cobbles together the name from bits and pieces of herself: the nickname her brother gave her when they were little, a common moniker for illicit internet activities, what they called the dog when Mom wasn’t around to hear it.

‘ _Okay,_ ’ she thinks, deep breath, scissors in hand. ‘ _I can do this._ ’

She practices the name in her head, again and again, until she believes it.

Pidge Gunderson

Pidge Gunderson

Pidge Gunderson

 

 

It starts small, a means to an end, but months pass, and Pidge becomes so much more.

Pidge is a spy behind enemy lines, staring them straight in the face day after day and not giving up.

Pidge is a ghost, who doctors files and corrupts systems until she can’t possibly be found.

Pidge finds intergalactic transmissions, follows the clues into the desert, into space, through the center of a wormhole. Pidge meets aliens, and maybe even helps them.

Pidge is the Green Paladin. And that? That’s…

She likes Pidge. She’s proud, to be Pidge.

 

 

Shiro tells her that her dad would be proud. Katie, he tells her, your dad would be proud. She thinks, that’s true, but it’s not exactly Katie doing the things he’d be proud of.

“I’m not,” she tells him later, when the sun has sunk much further down.

“Not what?”

“I’m not Katie.” He’s already agreed to keep it a secret, so there’s no reason to tell him this, except, well. It’s kind of nice, to say it out loud.

“Okay,” he agrees easily, eyes still on the horizon. After a few moments, he continues, more hesitantly, “Lance and Hunk call you ‘him.’ Is that…”

“ _No_. God, no.” She snorts. Sighs. Hates, and also loves, that Shiro knows this much about her. “That’s not real.”

“Okay,” he says again.

“But my name. I… haven’t been Katie in a long time. I don’t think I will be, not until I find my family.” And for all she knows, maybe not even then. It seemed so simple when she was six, but there are so many things she’s never seen coming. She has no idea who she’ll be. Life is better described in retrospect.

“Okay.” Like it’s the only word he knows. “You let me know, then.”

Pidge grins. “I’ll send up the bat signal.” She holds up a hand with the first two fingers raised: a sign language ‘K.’ It looks like a peace sign.

(Before Kerberos, a younger Takashi Shirogane, hair still black, told her he was fluent because his mother was deaf. He taught her how to spell her name. She only remembers half the letters.)

Shiro reaches out and pushes her thumb a little to the side. “On your signal,” he agrees, and sits with her a while longer before they go inside.

 

 

She comes clean just a couple of weeks later — “I’m a girl” — about the important things, at least.

Her name is not a topic of discussion. Of all the things she’s lied about, this isn’t one of them. She is Pidge Gunderson, still.

If they think about it, they’ll figure it out — her brother’s last name is ‘Holt,’ after all — but no one comes to her to ask. The name ‘Katie’ isn’t uttered on the ship, because right now, it doesn’t belong to anyone here.

 

 

She’s lost in space, stranded in a wasteland of alien leftovers, inhabited only by a strange species of colorful, fluffy balls of fur that seem to do just fine in the vacuum. She coos over them, pets their backs and examines their legs and tells them she’s glad they’re here. They’re the most adorable things she’s seen in a long, long time. She doesn’t name them.

It seems presumptuous. Sure, these little guys look simple, intelligence and community not unlike rabbits on Earth, but alien life has surprised her before. For all she knows, each one of them has a name already, something she probably can’t pronounce, and far be it from her to call them something else.

 

 

Coran gives her one of the Olkarian cubes to play with, and as terrified as she is to ruin the careful balance of nature and technology, curiosity wins out and she’s soon scouring through the thing’s belly in search of secrets.

She teaches it word association, how to hold more phrases than one at a time and respond more-or-less appropriately. Lance nearly jumps out of his skin with excitement the first time they’re having a meeting and the cube replies to Shiro’s use of the word ‘team’ with a loud “Wildcats!”

“That’s amazing,” he gushes, trailing her down the corridor afterwards. “Can you teach it to groan every time Keith says something broody?”

“I _could_ ,” she allows, but doesn’t commit.

“Amazing. You’re about to be my new best friend, little… Er, what’s this guy’s name?”

She shrugs.

“Rover 2.0?” he suggests, but Pidge shakes her head. Names can’t be transplanted that easily. Like a heart or a kidney, there are markers, blood types, a million factors to consider.

“I’ll think about it,” she says.

 

 

She spots Matt’s face on a recording and the world tilts sideways. It’s all she can do to bring her focus back to the mission at hand, to get them all out. It’s all she can do to keep breathing. _Matt._

Back at the castle, she can’t stop staring at the image. Shiro pulls her away from time to time, reminds her to eat and soothe Hunk’s constant worry. “You still with us, Pidge?” he asks, hand on her shoulder to guide her to the table.

Yes. She’s here.

 

 

Keith finds her crying three days after Shiro disappears. It’s not… She wants to be _better_ than this, but it was less than a week ago Shiro was rubbing her arm and telling her the Holts were out there, and she’d find them. She was so hopeful. The first solid lead in months. And now Shiro’s gone too.

She’s still not Katie, but God, what would she give to have someone around who could call her that even once.

Keith doesn’t put an arm around her like Shiro would, but he curls up against the wall just beside her. His voice cracks when he tells her he’s sorry. “Pidge, I miss him too.”

It only makes her cry harder.

 

 

She gives Black a try, she really does, but in the end, sinking back into Green’s familiar seat, she’s glad it didn’t take. She has so few pieces of herself left, stuck together with tape and glue. She’s not sure who she’d be, without this.

 

 

She’s not sure who any of them are, now. Without Shiro. Keith and Lance and Allura are all adjusting, and even she and Hunk struggle with the new status quo. It’s…

Like puzzle pieces that look like they should fit, but you try to stick them together and they don’t quite go. Like an instrument just out of tune, a map turned slightly clockwise. It grates against her skin, her bones. It itches.

 

 

And then Shiro’s back, and she breathes a long-deserved sigh of relief, as everything falls back into—

No. It doesn’t.

 

 

She doesn’t have a name for it, the way everything’s all right but not-quite-really.

She searches for it, like a word puzzle (she used to be so good at Boggle), in the way Shiro walks and talks. The way he smiles a little wider than he used to, the way he doesn’t take as long to brush his teeth. He takes twelve steps to cross the kitchen hallway. He tells Hunk and Coran that dinner is “fantastic.” The Black Lion doesn’t want him.

It’s wrong, it’s wrong, it’s wrong.

 

 

She takes to trailing after him, like a dog or a lovesick teenager. Lance teases her about it exactly once, and Shiro shuts him up with a stern look that’s just a little too heavy on the eyes to be normal. She knows things can change you, things like war and captivity and trauma. They _should_ change you. She just can’t find rhyme or reason for why it changed him like _this_.

She wants to just ask him, but she knows how he’d answer: one eyebrow cocked, a too-soft smile on his lips. “What do you mean, Pidge?” His fingers would reach up to play with the fringe of white bangs, quicker than they should. “It’s the haircut, isn’t it? I did the best I could.”

“What’s the word,” she asks Hunk one day, while Shiro is taking a nap, “for something that’s just a little bit out of alignment?”

“Askew.”

“No, that’s not it.”

“Askance,” he tries again. “Awry. Catawampus.”

“I’ll think of it,” she tells him.

 

 

None of the others seem to realize that anything is wrong. They give her strange looks when she mentions it.

“You must give him time to adjust,” Allura tells her, shepherding her further into the center of the group, probably for reassurance.

“Yeah, he’s still a little fuzzy from whatever those Galra assholes did to him.” Lance shrugs. “But he’s still the same old Shiro. And don’t worry, I’m sure you’re still teacher’s pet.”

“Lance, shut up.” Keith frowns. He’s the only one who might be taking her even a little bit seriously. “Do you really think something’s wrong with him?”

She’s not sure she wants to say yes.

 

 

Until a hand comes down on her shoulder — not the metal prosthetic, but a warm, solid, human hand — and sends a shiver down her spine for reasons even she can’t explain. She gasps, lurching away from the contact and banging against the nearest wall.

“You’re not real,” she chokes out. “You’re not real, you’re not real.”

She’s not getting enough air into her lungs. The man in front of her looks so goddamn concerned, she’d hit him if her limbs would stop shaking. He gives her space when she flinches back from his questioning hands, takes two steps back and then presses a panel on the wall to call the rest of the team down.

“Are you okay?”

“Take deep breaths.” One of Lance’s hands is on her back, the other pressing her own against his stomach. “C’mon, breathe with me. In and out. That’s it.”

Coran tries to get her to hold onto a packet of water. “What’s wrong?”

Her finger is still practically vibrating when she points it at the stranger. “That’s not Shiro,” she says. Doesn’t pose it as a question anymore, because it isn’t.

There’s dead silence. The man looks shocked. Everyone does.

“What?” Keith growls. He still sounds like he’s taking her seriously, but he doesn’t sound like he’s on her side anymore.

“That’s not Shiro,” she repeats. “I knew, I knew something was off, but I didn’t think… It’s not even _him_ , you guys, can’t you see it?”

“Uh, Pidge?” Hunk grins at her, a little hesitant at first and then big and wide, like he’s figured out the joke. “I know things have been a little rough lately, but c’mon, you know Shiro.”

“Yes,” she agrees.

“Does she have a fever?” Lance mutters. She lets him press the back of his hand to her forehead and doesn’t take her eyes off the man before her. “Maybe she’s hallucinating.”

The man sighs and reaches out. “Pidge—”

“Don’t _touch_ me!” she snaps, jerking out of reach.

“ _Pidge_.” Keith is angry, now, advancing on her and crowding her against the wall. She doesn’t mind. It’s not him she’s scared of. “Calm down. Shiro’s not going to hurt you.”

“That’s _not_ Shiro.” She’ll say it a thousand more times, if it gets them to listen. “You have no idea what he’ll do.”

Allura steps between them, pushes back against Keith’s chest with only a fraction of her strength, but it’s plenty. “Alright, let’s discuss this rationally. When did you start feeling—”

“You can’t tell me _you_ don’t feel it too,” Pidge begs her. “You don’t notice the difference?”

“What difference?” she asks patiently.

“Everything.” But Pidge understands the importance of discrete details, even if she doesn’t understand the need for them here. “He makes waffles slower than he used to, his laugh is different. He doesn’t wear _socks_.”

Everyone glances down at the man’s feet. He’s barefoot.

“So?” Hunk asks.

“So it’s not Shiro.”

“That’s—”

“I can prove it!”

“No.” Keith strikes a hand through the air, firm. “No. This has gone on long enough. I’m not letting you run _tests_ on him just because you’ve got it into your head somehow that he’s—”

“Keith it’s okay,” the stranger says, stepping forward with a gentle hand to turn Keith toward him. “If it’ll make her feel better, I’m fine with it.”

Keith shakes his head. “No, Shiro, that’s stupid. We don’t need to do that. Everyone knows there’s nothing wrong with you.”

“I don’t need to run any tests,” Pidge interrupts. “I just need to ask him a question.”

They stare at her. She stares back. She knows what she’s doing. She has no idea what’s going on, but she knows what she’s doing.

“Okay,” the man says. “What is it?”

“But—” Keith starts.

Coran pats him gently. “A question can’t hurt. Then we can put this all behind us.”

She doesn’t want to, but she steps up closer, just in front of the man. She needs to see his face. “I wish you were real,” she whispers.

A look crosses over him, like he wants to scoop her up and hold her against his chest until everything’s okay again, and it makes her ache. “Ask me,” he says.

She forces a tiny smile onto her lips. “Ready?” She brings up the first two fingers on her right hand, flashes him a peace sign.

His eyes flick down to the gesture, widen slightly. He looks back up at her, and waits. Her heart races. She was wrong. Oh, thank God, she was wrong.

“What’s my name?”

He smiles big and easy and it’s a little too far to the left, but if that’s just the way he is now, then it’s the most beautiful smile she’s ever seen in this world or any other.

“Pidge.”

No.

No, no, no. There are tears on her cheeks, and she doesn’t remember when they started.

“Pidge, hey, are you okay?”

“It’s not him.” She lets herself lean into Hunk’s welcoming chest, scrubbing a hand across her face. “It’s not him.” It’s a bone-deep knowledge. It’s irrefutable. She wishes it weren’t.

“What?” Lance asks. “What do you mean? Your name _is_ Pidge.”

“No, it’s not. It’s—” The word sticks in her throat, refuses to come out. “That’s a pseudonym. For the Garrison. I had another name, before. Shiro knew it. Shiro _knows_ it, and _that_ isn’t Shiro.”

The stranger rocks forward on his heels, then seems to remember himself. “Pidge, I’m sorry. My brain’s still kind of scrambled. Not as bad as last time, but… I’m sorry I can’t remember. When did you tell me?”

“Are you sure you even mentioned it to him?” Keith asks. He’s standing in front of the stranger now, between the man and Pidge, but his back is to the wrong person. “None of the rest of us knew about it, right?”

Everyone shakes their heads.

“He knew it before,” she tells him sharply, because it should be obvious. “He knew my family, remember?”

“That.” Hunk pauses, looks up at the stranger. “That does make sense. Wouldn’t you know it, man?”

The stranger winces. “We only met once, right before take-off. She was taking pictures with her brother. I was running final flight checks. If I’d known we were going to be fighting in a war together…” He chuckles. “I should have paid more attention.”

It’s not true. They met a dozen times, at least. “And I suppose my father and brother didn’t mention me once that whole way to Kerberos, huh?”

“I remember them talking about a sister, a daughter, I.” He shakes his head. “There’s still gaps.”

“Don’t _lie_.”

“Okay, stop it.” Keith grabs her arm, drags her back from Hunk, who yelps at the sudden loss. “You need to calm down. Now.”

Pidge tries to yank herself away, but his grip doesn’t waver. She glares at him. “ _You_ need to open your eyes and see what’s right in front of you. You agreed with me last week; you thought there might be something wrong with him.”

“Even if there was something wrong with him, it’s still _him_. He’s my brother.”

“ _Shiro’s_ your brother.”

Keith growls. “Stop saying it like that.”

“I’m not staying on this ship with that _thing_ around.”

“Then _leave_.”

He lets go of her arm, and she wheels out into empty space.

She realizes a moment later she hasn’t actually fallen over. She’s still standing. It doesn’t feel like it.

“Keith, _what the hell?_ ”

Lance is yelling, two inches from Keith’s face before anyone can blink, arms gesturing wide. Hunk looks scared behind him. Coran and the stranger (still acting the part) are on him as well, clearly trying to appeal to reason. Allura sets her jaw and moves forward to place a steady arm around Pidge’s shoulders.

Pidge moves sharply away before the arm settles. In the split second before she turns, she sees Keith’s face fall, aghast.

“Pidge, wait, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it!”

Maybe not, but she did. She can’t be on this ship if they insist on siding with a stranger, someone who walks around in Shiro’s skin like he owns it. She can’t. Especially not if it means Shiro’s still out there, somewhere.

“Pidge, please!”

She breaks out into a run. She knows the path by heart, learned from a thousand times she thought of running before now. She doesn’t like to admit she’s a coward, but it serves her on this occasion.

With a short command, the door to the hanger slams shut behind her and doesn’t reopen. She hears pounding. She ignores it. There’s a pod standing ready.

There’s yelling through the comms as she takes off, ripping out the portion of the navigation system that could be used to track her as she goes. Voices, calling out a name.

“I’ll bring him back,” she says, over the noise, then shuts off the link. It’s okay, it wasn’t her name anyway.

She’s not Pidge anymore. Pidge was a founding member of the new Alliance, the left arm of an elite team, pilot of the Green Lion. She left her bayard on the hanger floor.

She’s not Katie again, either. Katie had a family. She hasn’t found hers.

She doesn’t know who she is. That doesn’t matter. Life doesn’t come pre-written. She’ll figure it out as she goes.

She always has.


End file.
